


Nothing New. (Put your loving hand out, baby.)

by ftwnhgn



Series: go back and put it right. [1]
Category: Jersey Boys (2014), Jersey Boys - Gaudio/Crewe/Brickman/Elice
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, First Time, Groundhog Day, Holidays, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, M/M, Pre-Relationship, Time Loop, Y'all these tags make sense i swear
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-07
Updated: 2017-05-07
Packaged: 2018-10-29 05:02:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,208
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10847010
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ftwnhgn/pseuds/ftwnhgn
Summary: They are in Chicago on their first tour. Bob is twenty-one and he’s still a virgin. Frankie is neither of these things. He’s twenty-nine and shouldn’t feel a jealous tug in his chest when Bob goes off with some of the girls the label brought in for them.Frankie is twenty-nine and wakes up to relive the same day over again and again. They’re still in Chicago and Bob is still twenty-one, but he’s oblivious to the fact that they seem to be stuck in a time-loop.Frankie has to figure out how to break that curse and, meanwhile, has to see Bob walk away from him every day all over again. Or does he?





	Nothing New. (Put your loving hand out, baby.)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [gabrielgoodman](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gabrielgoodman/gifts).



> Nah, can't let these kids go, can I?
> 
> This is probably so far from actual canon events and historic accuracy as they come, but sue me, it's titled alternative universe for a reason! I became obsessed with the Groundhog Day musical, so this fandom gets a completely unnecessary Groundhog Day!AU sans Groundhogs, of course. I have not seen the stage version, only the movie, and listen religiously to the movie soundtrack and the obc recording. 
> 
> So, what I want to say with all this is: It's as fictional as it can get and was a super fun thing to write actually. There ya go!
> 
> Unbeta'd and I'm unfortunately still no native speaker, so any error that might appear is something I am deeply sorry for.
> 
> Title: Halsey - Eyes Closed, Beggin' - Frankie Vallie and The Four Seasons

They are tiptoeing around each other.

In fact, they have been tiptoeing around each other since the start of tour, or maybe even before, as much as Frankie can recall their antics. He knows when he got the first nasty glances from Tommy. He knows how relieved Bob looked the first time he defended him since they’ve been a four-piece. He knows Nick’s antics about the room-sharing on tour – he’s the chosen one Nick vents to when he again had enough of Tommy’s eccentrics and habits.

Frankie knows everything that happens between the four of them. If he wouldn’t, if he would let one word or action or glance slip, he couldn’t be the frontman of this band anymore. He knows this as well, has known it since he had to bribe Tommy into accepting Bob into the band. But even better does he know the way Bob looks at him when he thinks Frankie is busy with singing, not noticing how Frankie steals a glance at his adoring gaze every night on and off stage. He knows how Bob defended him one afternoon in front of Bob, who criticized Frankie for sounding off in the recording just an hour before.

_“He sounds fine, Crewe,” Bob has snarled, voice like venom and a look that could cut steal in his eyes and even grimmer lines on his young face. “In fact, he sounded pretty freaking great. Better than any of your other artist ever did and you know it. Cut him some slack, he’s been doing takes since nine in the morning. We all are exhausted, you know, but Frankie probably most of all. And instead of voicing this, he doesn’t say a word to you. He doesn’t want to upset you. So, you better not ruin his day and upset me like this.”_

Yeah, _that_ was epic.

And if Nick wouldn’t have dragged him away with an annoyed huff caused by finding Frankie eavesdropping, he would have heard the rest of that conversation. All he knows is that Crewe looked a little pale around his nose when they got back to recording.

So, he’s got a hunch about Bob’s ... feelings. At first, he was a bit put off by it, brushed the adoring glances and kind words and secretive smiles off as admiration or some sort of inspiration – Bob still wrote his songs with Frankie’s voice in mind, after all – but when they started to increase in the time passing and not the other way around Frankie knew there was more to it. And after figuring that out, he somehow breathed easier around Bob again. Not lighter, not yet, but easier.

He thinks about his own feelings for the younger man a lot. On the daily. Whenever he isn’t busy with something more attention-grasping, which is whenever he is not on a stage performing or in a recording booth singing with Bob pressed to his side. Even then it’s hard to not think about their young genius in a way that is a tiny bit more than just friendly coworking or platonic friends. He’s a bit scared of his thoughts, that’s what he is and whenever they stray to places he doesn’t know a lot of, he shushes them with a mental slap to the face.

It makes him think of Mary, of her and their daughter. Of their marriage that can’t be called marriage – he’s hardly home and he hates it and she does too, she takes care of Francine when he’s not there and she drinks and drinks and drinks. They fight whenever he is home and they don’t say goodbye when he goes away – and of the end that is in sight and that they can’t deny but postpone for the family’s sake. It makes him think about lying next to her in bed and wishing to be on tour and sharing a room with Bob instead.

He wants to crawl out of his skin whenever he remembers having these thoughts for days on end, and he never voices them out loud, not ever. Not even when he would be held at gun point and his life would end when he doesn’t confess.

It already feels to close to New Years, just after Christmas Eve, and they are somewhere in Chicago. Tommy is throwing some kind of after-show party with some girls he picked up from somewhere – Frankie doesn’t want to know what ‘ _somewhere’_ means or where it is, he only knows that the label is somehow involved in it – and Bob has been giving him these looks again. These sort of looks that aren’t promising anything, couldn’t even be dared to be filed under seductive, but make Frankie’s head spin anyway. They’re as adoring as ever, so unusually sweet and innocent, and such a contrast to the biting comments he throws in Tommy’s direction whenever he gets picked on by their guitarist. He stuck with Frankie most of the night, only excusing himself when he needed to go to the bathroom, and he’s acting less mature than he ever did before.

It’s weird, in some way, it’s very weird. And unsettling.

Frankie doesn’t know what to make of it or what to do with Bob that would ease his jumpiness whenever Nick or Tommy just start to make their way over to the couch they have occupied. Which isn’t that often, to be fair, because they are busy enough with their girls. But that doesn’t seem to help Bob at all, who is just kind of avoiding to look at anyone in the room, not even Frankie.

“You sure, you fine?” Frankie asks him and nudges his shoulder with his own.

Bob startles and looks up at him, his eyes glassy from the alcohol and bright from the ceiling lights. He nods violently and draws his eyes away to stare at nothing in particular again. “Yeah, yeah, sure.”

“I just-“ He starts and gets up from the spot on the couch he sat on for the last hour. “I think, I need to need a moment for myself.”  
  
And that is it.

Bob gets up and leaves his beer and Frankie behind in the hotel room. Frankie wants to say something, shout at him to come back or follow him, but he’s not on for intruding when the other party doesn’t seem to want it. He’s a decent human being after all, despite what Mary accuses him off and throws at his head when he’s home in Jersey.

This here is Chicago, after all, and Bob. And Bob knows that he is a good person.

So, he doesn’t follow him and instead spends the rest of the night on the couch, beer in hand but somehow forgotten. Bob doesn’t return back anymore, but Frankie doesn’t miss how Tommy pushes one of his girls into Bob’s hotel room and how the door closes behind them. He doesn’t miss the ice cold feeling pooling in his stomach and he doesn’t miss the moment everyone but him crowds around Bob’s door around two in the morning.

No, what he doesn’t miss at all, not even if he wanted to, is Bob’s dry voice, saying “Nick was right, it’s more fun with another person.”  
  
What he misses, though, is how the bottle in his hand falls to the floor, the ice in his stomach spreading up his body.

He’s too shocked to cheer when the rest does, so he does the sensible thing and leaves the suite for his own room.

He’s a decent person, after all.

 

*

 

Frankie wakes up to the sound of that weird radio clock just like the day before. Which is a surprise, in all honesty, because his hangover and long night should make him sleep in until at least noon. The radio host is talking about the weather, something about heavy snow and heavy wind, just like yesterday, and his co-host is laughing along to a dumb pun, just like yesterday, and before Frankie opens his eyes, he can hear Bob snorting at the bad humour, just like yesterday.

Something inside of Frankie draws in on itself at the sound and when he blinks his eyes open, Bob is already sitting on the edge of his bed, a sheet of paper in one hand and a pen in the other, working on a new song – _just like yesterday_. He’s also dressed in the same outfit as yesterday, which might be usual for the rest of them, but not for Bob. He still has the manners his mother raised him with in the fore-front of his mind, unlike Tommy or Nick, and cares about looking put together. He also showers two times a day, every morning and after every show, seeing Bob like this is unusual. And freaks Frankie out a bit, to be honest.

“Sorry, did I wake you up?” Bob says as he sees that Frankie is awake and, _huh_ , it’s exactly the same thing Bob said to him yesterday morning.

Frankie isn’t one for superstition or for magic or any of this nonsense, so he comes to the level-headed conclusion that he must be A) having one hell of a dream. B) dead due to alcohol poison or Tommy stabbing him because he had enough of him C) on one hell of a trip although he was never one for drugs, or D) the guys are pranking him, which would seem the most likely, wouldn’t it be a known fact that Bob would rather break all of his fingers himself than side-up with Tommy to do something that Frankie wouldn’t be a fan of.

The last possibility is that he went absolutely batshit. But he rules that out. Because he is a well-reasoning, smart person, after all. He’s not turning crazy or having a breakdown before Tommy had his, _he is not_. That’s not how the universe works.

“I’m going down to catch breakfast,” Bob then says, just like yesterday. _Jesus_. “Or should I wait for you? I can also wait.”

Frankie waves him off. “No, no, go,” he winces, his voice hopefully not as hoarse to Bob as it is to his own ears. “I’ll be right there with ‘ya. Give me just a minute.”

Bob gives him a mildly concerned look, but gets up and leaves the room anyway, which is audible through his short “Okay,” and the sound of the door opening and closing.

Frankie turns onto his back and stairs at the ceiling, letting out a deep sigh now that Bob is away. He remembers everything from last night, especially how it ended, and it seems a bit weird that Bob seems to be as unaffected as ever by his life-changing decision. (Okay, maybe not deeply life-changing, but kind of big anyway. It’s not every day that you lose your virginity, in fact there is only one day you can lose your virginity.) And that he’s literally acting the same way as yesterday is even more suspicious. It’s not right. Something is off, clearly, but Bob didn’t want to address it in front of Frankie, or maybe he wanted to sparse him the emotional turmoil or _whatever_ , but Frankie wants to know what is going on exactly.

So, he’s spending the day analyzing every little thing, every little detail and every little word that’s happening in his presence. After a breakfast that is exactly like the one yesterday with the exact same conversation _sans_ Frankie’s input because he’s too busy freaking out over All. Of. This, they’re off to rehearsal for the concert and Tommy comes in later to tell them about the girls the label brought in for them. Nick cheers and high fives Tommy, which ends in a weird side hug between showing affection and wanting distance in front of the others. And Bob stands awkwardly to the side, staring down at his keyboard like it holds all the secrets of the world in its keys. Nobody really pays attention to Frankie, because he’s the married and committed one of them.

  _Exactly. Like. Yesterday_.

Frankie starts to freak out more and more when the hotel addresses him with a phone call for him and before even picking up the call he knows it’s Mary asking him why he left so early although it _is_ Christmas. And he’s saying the same thing he did the day before – but not because he magically does, this is by choice – and she hangs up on him dissatisfied and pissed, spitting some bullshit about him being the worst husband on earth. He thinks about answering with “ _Well, you never married Tommy, so you can’t exactly say-“_ but the well-known sound of silence is his answer, followed by the beeping noise of a hung-up receiver on the other end of the landline.

It all goes south pretty much from there and, to top it all of, Bob is staying by his side from the time it becomes darker outside just like he did yesterday. They do their show – Bob is right there on his right, of course he is. They leave the stage and refresh – Bob has his arm around Frankie’s shoulders and grins and even has the nerve to laugh about something Tommy said and it’s as unsettling as it was the first time that happened. They go to their hotel – Bob and he change in their suite before going over to Tommy and Nick’s just to be greeted by their bandmates and the girls, somehow perfectly fine with clinging around Tommy or Nick, or both of them.

They end up on the white couch again and Bob is giving him these looks again and Frankie doesn’t know what to do with this again and he can’t help but deflate any possibility at conversation between them, too busy with figuring out what the fuck is happening to jump into Bob’s offered conversation starters. So, they both say nothing and Bob fidgets around, his knees nudging Frankie’s and it’s like a hot wire. That did _not_ happen the first time and Frankie looks up into Bob’s face, who looks just as clueless by Frankie’s snapping reaction as Frankie _feels_. He seems to take Frankie’s startled response as territory he’s not supposed to tread into, so he hastily gets up from the couch.

Frankie wants to say something – anything – but he feels tongue tied and weirded out and so tired from whatever is going on in the universe, or rather his life, right now. So he doesn’t say anything at all and watches Tommy throw an arm around Bob’s neck, hears him say “Bobby!” too loudly and too excited and then he watches as Bob gets pushed into a room, the same girl following him inside like yesterday.

He feels the bile rise in his throat, but Frankie had enough. If this is the universe’s big fat sign to show him how he fucked up, well. Then it worked out exceptionally. He got it. He’s not picking anyone’s flower anytime during this time of the year. Really, he doesn’t even want to do that…. He thinks, sorta kinda. He believes.

This time, Nick is watching him with raised eyebrows and a concerned look as he leaves the suite. But Frankie is holding the snide remark in his throat and just slams the door a bit too hard. He’s so strung out, but he’s a decent person. That’s why he goes to bed instead of doing something he might regret.

He can’t wait to wake up in the morning and go on with his life. He feels like he learned his lesson, thank you.

 

*

 

When Frankie wakes up to the same noise as the other two days before, he can’t even hold the loud and exhausted sigh in, that creeps up from his chest. He doesn’t even want to open his eyes this time and it has nothing to do with some kind of a hangover, because this time around he doesn’t even have one to begin with. He was too busy cursing the universe than indulging in any kind of excessive drinking last night. Not even seeing Bob walk away from him a second time could make him do it.

“Sorry, did I wake you-“

“No,” Frankie groans before Bob can even finish the question he asked Frankie the last two times. “You didn’t.”

Frankie can hear Bob exhaling a shaky breath – relief – and opens his eyes just a hitch. Blurrily, but in the same clothes as the other two days, he can see Bob out of the corner of his eye, sitting there on his bed with the stupid song sheet and the stupid pencil and his stupidly anxious face as he watches Frankie watching him. Screw it all, Frankie thinks sourly, as he now can only associate this expression with Bob’s knee pressed against his and his wide eyes in a comical shock looking down at him in horror, like he committed a murder or, worse, agreed to do something Tommy proposed.

Really. _Screw it all_.

“I’m going to catch breakfast,” It’s the first time Frankie can see Bob motioning to the door when he says this, his face now less anxious but still a bit too tight for Frankie’s liking. The kid never seems to have a chill second, does he? 

“Or should I wait for you?” Uncertainty dances in his eyes and makes his knuckles crack against each other as he still watches Frankie watching him and Frankie’s stomach feels like somebody put thorns into it. What the hell? “I, I can wait for you.” And when he says it, his voice sounds kind of off and too edgy and too nervous and the tightrope around Frankie’s throat isn’t there because of his tiredness or because he isn’t more awake, no, this time he’s noticing all of Bob’s itches and edges, like he can’t be out of the room fast enough, like he can’t be farther away from Frankie, and it hurts.

The thorns in his stomach hurt. Hurts like it did when Mary told him to _stay the hell where he is_. Hurts like the sorry words every girl ever riled up for him when they rejected him – _too young, not man enough, not my type, hell, are you even American?_ – although he never grieved these kind of _moments_ ever. You can’t force yourself when there’s nothing in the place you usually find a mutual attraction or the kind of warmth and sweetness of blossoming love. And at least they let him down gently. But the sting was still there, always, every time, like clock work, when the look in their eyes changed and they sort of grieved him, grieved the thing they were looking for and not finding in Frankie.

Yes, it hurt.

Young love always does.

Frankie doesn’t say anything at first and Bob looks as uneasy as the dryness in Frankie’s mouth and he starts to get up from the bed to leave Frankie alone, but as he looks for his shoes, Frankie stops him.

“You can wait. If you’re not that hungry. I’m just going to get dressed.”

Bob turns around and his eyes are that Micky Mouse-kind-of wide again, all soft surprise and no edge. But he nods anyway, splutters several “Sure” and “Cool” out before awkwardly waiting for Frankie by the door.

This time, the day seems to progress a bit differently than the last two times. Their breakfast is still a bit tense, Tommy still reels in far too late for rehearsal, but when the girls are mentioned Frankie looks over to Bob, who now answers his glance with an uneasy half-shrug that Tommy doesn’t see and Nick pointedly ignores, so Tommy doesn’t see it. Bob keeps clinging to him through the whole evening, just like the last two times, except for when Frankie gets the call from Mary and gets send to hell by her once again. He brushes it off with the nonchalance of finished business – he has the distinct feeling that he can’t change these sort of events – and starts to accept that he somehow seems …… Stuck? Stuck, that’s probably what’s the word he’s looking for to describe his situation to himself.

Bub today is still different, still new, and Bob touches his shoulder and he touches his back in return and Nick cracks a joke instead of Tommy and everyone laughs, even Crewe. Frankie starts to have a distinct feeling that today could end in a new way, he’s actually positive about it, but once Crewe leaves them to their own devices, busy doing or screwing whatever himself, it goes south _again_. Bob is as nervous as he was the last two times and, honestly, how nervous can one person be at the prospect of intercourse with someone else? It’s kind of crazy. Sure, Tommy and Nick are obsessed with it, and he had his fair share himself – he’s married after all, for Heaven’s sake – but Bob seems to turn downright nauseous at the mere thought of sex and intimacy.

It’s not making this easier. Not at all.

Frankie wants to chew off the end of his bottle, because Bob is as startled and unsure as ever, as before, as the last two times, and right now Frankie even looks as much as forward to seeing Tommy work his magic and getting Bob laid, because it’s unbearable, that’s what it is.

Bob is on his fifth beer and he’s staring at the hard liquor like it’s the solution to all of humanity’s failures and then he looks at Frankie. Frankie can see out of the corner of his eye how Bob’s drunken gaze turns soft, melts a bit, but then his knee brushes against Frankie’s thigh – nothing more than an accident – and he moves away like he’s been burned, the fracture of a promising moment lost between them over the noise of the girls and the harsh light on the ceiling.

Bob gets up without saying a word, but even before Tommy reaches him to do what Frankie already knows what will happen, he leaves the suite behind. This time, though, he answers Nick’s questioning glance with the steeliest look he can muster. At least leave an impression on one of them, Frankie thinks, though it will be in vain anyway.

Nick won’t remember, after all.

But Frankie certainly does. His skin feels torched at every point Bob touched him.

He doesn’t wait for Bob to come back – he won’t – and braces himself for another day of torture before he falls asleep.

 

*

 

So, he’s completely stuck in a loop. Reliving the same day over and over and over and over again. At least that’s what Frankie figured out after all the same days he endured since coming to Chicago (On that note, _fuck Chicago_ ). He counts them as well, currently he’s on Day fourty-four and in the span of these he found out that Bob is currently working on a song without a title but with some dangerously high notes for Frankie just as some criminally low sections for Nick. He found out that when Tommy comes by with the message from the label, he’s late because he’s thinking about Nick’s reaction to these first-glance-kind-of good news. He found out that Nick fucks up during Sherry, if he and Tommy haven’t talked before the show, but what they talk about Frankie doesn’t know. Because privacy, and all that. Frankie was raised well.

He found out that Mary will not turn into a sweeter version of herself during their phone call just because he tries to promise her to come back earlier. No matter what he says, she’ll stay unconvinced and unhappy and mean, vile threats and insults growing more colourful the more Frankie tries to make of the phone call. He found out that Crewe is screwing some “old friend”, or at least that’s what his excuse is the two times Frankie carefully nudges him about his evening Christmas plans. Through that he also found out that Bob rather wants him at home than playing a show. _Huh_ , good to know.

But what’s business is business and money doesn’t fall from the clouds for Frankie yet.

On Day fourty-five, Frankie decides to shake things up and instead of eating breakfast with the guys, he’s finding Crewe and bribes him as long as he can until the man voluntary gives up his car keys for Frankie to drive down to New Jersey. Traffic is a mixture of two extremes on his way. He’s either close to being stuck in traffic or the road is completely empty except for the snow falling down. On the drive down he tries to stop thinking about Bob and the hurtful look he will have when he hears that their frontman – Frankie – has bailed out on them, because, what? He feels sorta homesick for his family? Yeah, that sure as shit will turn his day around and make it better.

But Frankie has no other choice. He’s seen Bob walking away from him fourty-four times now and if he does so again, he might turn crazy. Because he doesn’t know what to do about this. He doesn’t know how to change this. Whatever he says or does or tries, Bob will still go up from that damn couch and walk up to Tommy, no matter how close they get and how gentle Frankie acts around him. Once the party stars, Bob’s whole usual façade is stripped away and he will become the nervous wreck Frankie had to endure far too often for his liking.

So he’s taking a way out, at least one day, and leaves his bandmates and Crewe to their own devices, while Francine is opening the front door and all but shrieks and jumps into his arms. He kisses her forehead and picks her up and when Mary sees him in the doorway, she moves away from their house phone to greet him. Their kiss is brief and lacks any passion or tension – unlike any small touch from Bob, which more or less sets Frankie’s inside on fire and makes him jerk off in the shower in their suite when Bob is busy getting it on with some girl and he stalked off out of sheer bitterness – but it’s warm and familiar and she doesn’t slap him or throws him out, so it’s at least a start.

 He spends the day with them all, talks a bit about tour, but mainly listens to Mary vent on about some matters in the neighbourhood and even more so listens to Francine talk. They get along well and no fight seems to be in sight. Mary is even sober for once, and after he puts Francine to bet, they’re sitting in the living room, just talking in a way they used to do at the start of their relationship. It’s a nice change to the white couch and the nervous energy Bob usually radiates around this time of the day and when Mary gets up to answer an incoming phone call – who even calls at half past midnight during the holidays? – he looks up at the ceiling of his living room and lets out a deep breath. This, this feels good. Different to the routine of the past _weeks,_ but not bad _._ This is familiar and satisfying in its own way and Frankie doesn’t have to watch Bob walk away to something he can’t seem to stomach. He doesn’t have to response to Nick’s unhappy look or has to say nothing to the way Tommy clings to Bob before he throws him into that bedroom.

“Frankie? It’s for you,” Mary calls as quietly as she can from the hallway.

He knits his brows together in slight confusion, but gets up to take the call. When he takes the phone in his hand, he signals her to leave the hallway and, thankfully, she follows his instructions although she doesn’t look happy. Well, they survived only so long without upsetting each other, that must count for _something_.

“Yes, hello?” He knows not greeting the caller is kind of rude, but he can’t be arsed when there won’t be any consequences for it tomorrow.

“Frankie? It’s – I – I don’t know – I slept with Crewe.”

The thorns in his stomach turn to ice pickles that slice him open and Frankie closes his eyes in pain. Wasn’t he a decent person, somewhere deep inside of him?

He doesn’t deserve this, he thinks, as the pain grows into every part of his body. He watches Mary, who stands slightly worried and hilariously pissed in the doorway, and he doesn’t deserve this.

“Frankie? Are you there?”

Bob sounds anxious. Concerned. Nervous. Hurt.

“Yes. Yes, I am.”

And that’s the problem, isn’t it? Despite it all, for some crazy reason he can’t explain, because the universe has its way, he’s _still_ there.

 

*

 

To no one’s surprise, he wakes up in his hotel bed again. The radio clock is happily babbling along on the right side of the bed while Frankie rolls over onto the left, ignoring the cheery voices and the weather forecast. This, he thinks grimly, this is hell. Real life hell on earth. His bones and his organs still feel like he went through the ringer and when Bob asks him if he woke him up, he waves him off and buries deeper into the sheets.

Thankfully, Bob takes this as his cue to go, Frankie not in the mood to see his concern and anxiety directed at him. Not after that hammer of a night yesterday. Or today. Or on day fourty-five. Or what the fuck ever, because no one but Frankie is keeping count here. And sure as shit not Bob, who now has lost his virginity a total of fourty-five times, and if that isn’t one hell of a story than Frankie doesn’t know what it. Unfortunately, no one but himself can celebrate this great fact, so he’s left to himself and his own foul mood, in no way down for a celebration.

The single fact that one of these hell scenarios ended in Bob losing his virginity to, to …. Crewe, out of all people, is enough to turn Frankie into a nauseous ball of a person, and it takes everything in him to remind himself that this only happened in his reality and no one else’s, because he went away to visit Mary, and that Crewe actually didn’t do anything _today_.

Now, that teaches him exactly two things: One) Don’t ever leave this band behind. It will only end in pain, chaos and in him possibly getting arrested for throwing a tantrum that is a tad bit more than verbal abuse when he sees Crewe. And Two) Trying to mend any of the burning bridges between him and Mary is as fruitless as harvesting on dead land, so he just leaves their shambled marriage to the side, rotting away on its own.

How that is supposed to help him fix things and get out of this time-loop is a mystery to him, but he still tucks these revelations away to a corner of his mind where he won’t forget them. One never knows when these things might come in handy.

The hotel room is also not showing him a solution for his problems, so he takes a shower, styles his hair and gets dressed to head down for a late breakfast. They guys are already seated around one table, just like they always are, and after fetching himself a cup of coffee he sits down in the seat across from Tommy and next to Bob. Their thighs brush together and although Bob doesn’t jump at the contact or moves away from Frankie, his hand is a bit shaky when he puts some butter on his toast.

“You alright over there? You seem a bit pale, Snow White,” Tommy asks teasingly, never one to miss a chance to pick on their youngest member.

Despite the notion of nervous behavior, Bob seems to gather his self to brace Tommy’s efforts to throw him off. “Sure, sure,” he answers. “At least my prince came. Yours seems to be stuck with one of the seven dwarfs.”

Nick is snorting into his cereals, seriously working on trying to contain his laughter while Frankie tries to cover up the obvious way he chokes on his coffee. And is that Bob’s thigh rubbing against his while Tommy seems to have lost his bite and Bob looks at him with a teeth-rotting grin? Frankie can’t be sure, because he still has to recover from Bob’s remark.

Now, day fourty-six is shaking things up. This _never_ happened before.

They finish their breakfast in silence from then on, Nick staying behind to read the newspaper (and to school Tommy on his table manners, probably) and Bob going to find wherever Crewe is hiding out to show him the song he’s been working on. Frankie tells himself that this is fine, that there’s no reason for an uprising urge to keep Bob from going to Crewe or to either go with him to stand behind him and monitor their exchange like some kind of legal guardian Bob doesn’t need – he’s twenty-one after all and much better at this whole negotiating and talking business thing than Frankie ever was outside of his old neighbourhood.

He justifies it with the one thing he’s been telling himself every day since this hell started – he’s a decent person.

Plus, he usually trusts Bob enough to do his own decisions. That’s not changing just because the universe is giving Frankie Castelluccio the big _Fuck You_.

Their rehearsal goes smoothly, surprisingly, and Tommy is only five minutes late, but he still offers them the great news. This time, Frankie can see the tired lines on Nick’s forehead and this time, when he looks up at Bob, he’s smiling a bit sheepishly at him and when Frankie cocks his head a bit, Bob just shakes his head. But Frankie doesn’t miss how when he turns away, Bob’s hand is squeezing his shoulder, while his other one is busy ghosting over the keys of his keyboard. Tommy and Nick are still busy with themselves, so Frankie reaches out and squeezes Bob’s elbow. Because he’s brave, for once, and because they’ve been tiptoeing around each other long enough. And because Frankie takes what he can gets.

“Now, that’s bold,” Bob leans over and whispers into his ear, a grin on his face.

“The old marrieds are busy anyway,” Frankie whispers back, the genuine humor in his voice also something that surprises him today.

Bob snorts, but nods along. “True,” he responds and his nose is brushing Frankie’s temple when he draws back again.

If it was by accident or a perfectly calculated move Frankie doesn’t know, because in that moment Tommy loudly declares the beginning of rehearsals. But the tingle Frankie feels up his spine and the way Bob’s grinning through every song and every comment Tommy throws at him gives him the small hope that Bob didn’t just brush against him.

Maybe the universe is a bit kinder on this day.

Their show goes incredibly well and Frankie could hold his phone call with Mary to the minimal amount of time, only excusing himself from his conversation with Bob for five minutes. Bob is still sticking to his side like there’s no tomorrow – no pun intended – but he’s cheerful and snarky towards Tommy and on stage he’s as sharp as ever. He’s a delight of a man, and not as concerned like all the days before, the uneasy tension not resting in his shoulders and in his eyes and when Tommy is excitedly talking about the girls the label got for them, he jokes about Tommy not getting it on since summer due to his lack of _table manners_. He imitates Nick’s voice on the last two words and Frankie laughs so loud, that Nick is shooting them a glare and Tommy asks them what’s so funny. Frankie’s lips stay sealed shut and he just motions to Crewe and the stage, an encore clearly waiting for them.

In the hallway of their hotel floor, Tommy asks them if they come by later, the party already starting, and Frankie is holding his breath. This is usually the point where Tommy talks to them until Bob reclines and accepts the invitation, just to make Tommy shut up and stop bothering him, and it’s also usually the time Bob starts to become fidgety and filled to his hairline with anxiety.

“Oh, no. Not tonight, Tommy. You have your fun, I’m just so beat up. Maybe next time,” Bob says. _Bob says_. And means it.

Tommy whines about how Bob says this every time and how it’s not even really fun without Bob and Frankie there, but Bob holds his point and Frankie is too dumbfounded to respond to Tommy asking him with anything else than a hasty “Nah, not tonight.”

After a few more attempts at getting them to come, Bob just says goodnight and turns around to head towards his and Frankie’s room, while on the opposite end of the hallway the door opens and some girls and Nick stumble out to call for Tommy. Tommy takes this as his cue to also leave Frankie alone and before Frankie turns around, Nick’s gaze meets his and a knowing nod is given to him, as well as a satisfied smirk, and Frankie has the feeling that he missed something between the lines.

He tries to not let it consume all of his mind when he goes back to his room, where Bob is sitting on the bed already, watching something on the TV.

“You’re fine?” He asks Frankie as he notices him closing and locking the door behind him, a habit drilled into him after being raised in Jersey and several tour dates already behind them.

“Yeah,” Frankie answers, the tension suddenly back between them, all fueled by Bob’s attentive question. Or maybe that’s just Frankie going crazy from all the pent-up tension inside of him. After all he has more than fourty days on Bob in this department. “Yeah, I’m fine.”

Bob nods, but doesn’t look back at the television screen. All the tremor around his eyes and the steely lines in his young features are smoothed aside by a curious openness that reminds Frankie of the very first time Bob caught his eye a few years ago. He was even younger back then and back then the world seemed to be alright with Frankie happily married and Bob nothing more than a young genius who wanted to write songs for his voice, somehow getting Tommy to agree to an insanely smart business agreement.

Back then, Frankie needed someone like Bob. Without him they never would have gone anywhere near a record company or Chicago. Without him, they’d still be playing the same songs in the same bars, waiting for Tommy to come out of jail occasionally or for Nick to show off his newest girlfriend while Tommy tries to scare her off with some rude pick-up lines from his side.

Frankie needs Bob now too. Needs him to ease the unhappy pile of tension coiled up in his body. Needs him to melt the ice in his stomach and veins. Needs him to make sense of all of this. Needs him to let the universe go on with it already.

He _needs_ him. So much that it eats him alive.

This here, this is not only some sort of young love developing in a place it shouldn’t root in to begin with. This is a bone-aching and all-consuming need Frankie has never felt before, not with any girl back at home, not with Tommy and not, no, never with Mary at all. This is something different, something else. Something entirely new.

He can’t get the way Bob looks at him out of his head. He can’t get his own feelings back to the place where they stayed quiet and didn’t make the tiniest of sounds. He just _can’t_. Not anymore.

If he has to see Bob walk away from him one more time, he wouldn’t know what to do.

“Frankie?” Bob’s voice draws him in, and his eyebrows are both raised in curiosity, as he must have watched Frankie’s thoughts traveling away from him and his emotions playing out across his face.

Frankie makes a decision then and there.

“Tell me you want this.” He walks across the room and turns the TV off. “Tell me you want this as much as I want it,” he says again and Bob’s eyes don’t turn comically wide again when Frankie is stepping up to him, his knees nudging Bob’s apart to stand between them.

Bob’s eyes are clear and focused and Frankie can hear him draw in a shuddering breath, can actually imagine how his hands are trembling, how he’s debating in his mind right now, how he’s trying to find a way out.

Well, not this time. Not tonight.

“If you tell me, you don’t want this, then tell me right now and I’ll stop,” Frankie offers and he looks down at Bob and Bob looks up at him from his sitting position.

His heartbeat must be so loud that Bob can hear it. That it can be heard through the walls of this room. The whole of Chicago must hear his heart skip a beat when Bob closes his eyes briefly when he takes another breath, this time a bit steadier, and his left hand moves to the small of Frankie’s back, a careful but well-thought touch, the answer to the question.

“I’m stuck here, and I don’t want to be stuck anymore,” Frankie whispers into the small space between their faces.

Their lips don’t crash against each other and the kiss is still lacking any kind of, well, of fireworks. Not that Frankie ever believed in anything like that – Crewe’s songs and all these romantic novels tend to go a bit overboard in their descriptions. It’s messy and uncoordinated, but it feels good, so, so good and some of the tension inside Frankie finally uncurls itself as they kiss. Bob’s low sounds against his mouth are sending pleasant tickles down his spine and the way his arm circles around Frankie’s waist is _perfect_.

It’s then and there that Frankie decides that no matter to which day he would wake up to tomorrow, he would kiss Bob again and again and again. Gladly. Happily. Willingly. No second thoughts.

When they part for breath, he opens his eyes again and meets Bob’s half-lidded gaze.

“That was-“

“I know.”

They both start to laugh at the same time, faces resting against each other, and Frankie kisses the laughter from Bob’s cheekbones and then his lips, opening him up and drinking him in and never letting him go. His own hands are on Bob’s neck, the skin is warm where Frankie touches it, and it’s different than any other time Frankie has done it, but it’s great. It feels amazing in a way nothing has before and for a brief moment Frankie thinks about how he surely understands the appeal Crewe sees in _this_ now.

It feels like they’re kissing for hours, always starting again after they part and the needy tones of Bob’s voice nestle into Frankie’s mind and make him feel hot all-over. He has the inkling that Bob feels the same. Or at least he hopes so.

Somehow, they fall backwards onto the bed, Frankie still on top of Bob, and when they look at each other again, Bob bites down on his own lip, at first not meeting his eyes, only after a few seconds of studying a point somewhere on Frankie’s forehead or hair do his eyes travel down to answer Frankie’s own.

“I want you,” he breathes out, rushed and visibly nervous.

Frankie looks down at him, sees and hears the small and unsure laughter shaking Bob for a short moment before he ends up fiddling with the collar of Frankie’s shirt, finger’s moving under the fabric and touching the skin above Frankie’s collarbone.

“Are you sure?” Frankie asks, because he has to. Because he couldn’t forgive himself if he didn’t.

But Bob nods, anxious _but_ sure. “I want you,” he repeats. “I want this. God only knows how long I’ve wanted this.”

Frankie is now the one to raise his eyebrow in surprise. “With me?”

Bob looks away, clearly a bit embarrassed, if the red in his cheeks is anything to go by. “With you. No one else. Never anyone else.”

Frankie smiles – _how could he not?_ – and kisses Bob again.

Bob meet him halfway and from then it’s nothing but the sweet taste of skin on skin, laughter, nervousness and, most importantly, surrender.

For the first time in a long time, Frankie doesn’t care how the next day will start. He’s too busy savoring the sight of Bob letting go and coming undone.

It’s a dream come true.

 

*

 

Frankie wakes up to an arm curled around his side and the annoying radio clock. He groans and pushes his eyelids closer, preparing himself for the forecast for Christmas day. Really, he’s used to it by now and too lethargic to do anything about it at this point.

“-And today we will finally have sunshine, though the temperature will still be close to freezing point.”

Frankie opens his eyes and keeps them open despite the light of the morning streaming in between the blinds and the shock he feels can be the only reason for him even surviving with the harsh light tarnishing his eyes.

 _This is new_.

“No,” a voice comes from behind him. _Bob’s_ voice comes from behind him and now shock mixes with a good portion of delight and horror.

What if-?

“Frankie, make it go away,” Bob mumbles into his neck and pulls the sheets higher up around them, so that Frankie is entirely buried beneath them and they probably now reach up to Bob’s forehead.

“I can’t,” he tries and pushes the sheets far enough away from him, so that his nose is at least above them. “It’s an alarm clock.”

“I don’t care,” Bob responds and sounds more like a pissed kid than a twenty-one-year-old man.

Frankie turns around in the embrace and once he faces Bob, nudges him with a kick against his shin until the younger man opens his eyes at least _a_ _bit_. That’s a victory in itself, to be honest, and Frankie truly prides himself with it.

It is the small things that make life sweeter, after all.

But before he can even say something, Bob kisses him sweetly but only curtly, quickly moving away again.

“Sorry,” he apologizes already, but Frankie just puts a hand on his shoulder and shakes his head.

“You don’t have to,” he answers, moves his hand to Bob’s face and kisses him again, a little bit less quickly and a little bit warmer.

“I’m glad it was you,” Bob says, once they draw apart again.

Frankie grins. “I’m glad it was me too.”

Bob’s answer is a snort and elegantly rolling away and out of bed. “Oh, don’t get full of yourself now,” he says in a mischievous tone while picking up his clothes for his morning shower.

Frankie turns onto his back in the bed, the sheets now low enough for him to move better around, and watches Bob at his drilled-in routine.

“I’m not,” he declares pointedly, “Getting full of myself. I’m just happy,” he adds on, trying to transport at least a tiny fraction of the relief he feels now that this very special nightmare is over. In every way possible. Really, he could start crying happy tears on the spot now, but that would be too much. And would freak Bob out as well, probably. Surely.

“Me too,” Bob tells him, honesty visible in his oh-so expressive eyes. It’s a sight _Frankie_ could start to write songs about. “I was a bit scared of it, but, well. It felt right.”

Frankie smiles and nods.

When they come down for a short breakfast before taking off for the next tour stop, Nick eyes him in a way that makes Frankie feel like he’s being deconstructed while chewing on his toast. It doesn’t take long for an explanation, though, once Tommy and Bob get up to get some more food at the same time, Nick puts his newspaper onto the table.

“I’m glad you two finally figured it out. Seeing you suffering like this was worse than Tommy’s rants. You’re a good person, Frankie, you should have gotten that sorted out way earlier. Fourty days of all this was a bit much, wasn’t it?”

A response is stuck in Frankie’s throat, because Bob and Tommy return again and sit down next to them and while Bob’s hand is an everlasting presence on his back and Tommy is in a good mood for once, Frankie can’t help but stare at the economy section of the newspaper while Nick is busy reading his sports section.

Nick is right, of course. In every aspect.

It was all a bit much, in the end.

Wasn’t it?

 

**Author's Note:**

> Nick is the real deal, always has been.
> 
> hey, so, if you have liked that, leave a comment if you want, or chat with me on tumblr (andreinbolkonsky) or twitter (xbigboysdontcry) where I cry over these four idiots a lot.
> 
> friendly reminder: you are loved, you are enough and you will achieve great things. you are right just the way you are, a living and breathing thing. keep going.


End file.
